Here’s a look at what Jo Fletcher books have coming for you over the period January to June 2016! We’ll be bringing you our particular recommends of all publishers together by month of publication. Note: Publication dates are liable to change and some jackets are still to come…

Walter had five bodies on the bed of his wagon. Judging by the clean holes through their heads, they’d stay that way. He liked that: one less thing to worry about. They weren’t bleeding much, either. The boards of his wagon were stained plenty already; the rusty smell was a constant, as were the specks. But it was important to keep the bed clean. He had a reputation to think of.

He waited on the edge of Pine Ridge until dawn, and then waited some more. Law-Man Miller was not an early riser. Walter couldn’t fault him for that – Pine’s trouble kept late hours. He licked his lips at the memory of whiskey and took a slug from his water-skin, then grimaced; he didn’t have the imagination to fool his mouth. Collect from the Law-Man first, then see to Patches and the wagon, and then a soft bed and a soft body. He rubbed the base of his back. He’d earned a little respite. He glanced at the bodies in the wagon. A canvas sheet covered all but their feet.

‘I too have earned it!’ They stayed silent.

*
He rubbed his nose and was shocked at the chill of his finger. He’d waited long enough. The first flick of the reins had no effect. He leaned over to find Patches asleep. The shaggie’s talent for sleeping standing up rankled him and he slapped the reins harder. He was pleased with the resulting snort as Patches lurched forward, the wheels creaking their own protest. They were all idle – he was the only one in this outfit who understood hard work. As he rolled into Pine Ridge, he figured he might be the only one in the whole county. Read the rest of this entry »

1

It is a rare thing, to see change coming. Embracing it is rarer still. We cling to the past even as we dream of the future, fearing always that what might be gained cannot make up for what must be lost. Those few who have an instinct for metamorphosis know only too well how bitterly it can be resisted, how unlikely it is for evolution to occur without struggle. They know that transition is most often an ungentle business, and that many weapons can be employed against it.

They know there will be casualties.

Among those few are a man and a woman: friends, lovers, partners: pillars of strength and dispensers of wisdom, although the latter is in short supply at the moment. They have received unwelcome news, though it may shed light on much else that troubles them; and so they grapple with it, trying to understand what it means and how it fits.

*
The man knows the woman is better at this than he is. For all his scholarship and training and experience, for all that he has been proven right far more often than otherwise, she has a gestalt gift that he cannot match. As he watches her framed against the city’s skyline he knows that she is sifting through the cacophony of pending events, looking for connections, parallels, patterns. Read the rest of this entry »

The two months following August are where publishers traditionally bring out their big guns ready for a certain festive season; that said August is a pretty heavyweight month as far as we’re concerned, with some cracking mass market paperbacks, not to mention trades and hardbacks of particular note.

And our top picks aren’t the end of the either, so check out the individual Publisher links for their July to December output: plenty more on those as well!

Herein, via links to individual pages, lies the more-or-less complete output of UK SFF and major worldwide Graphic Novel publishers for July to December 2015!

We’ve applied selection criteria with the assumption that readers with a penchant for paranormal romance and titles more for the American market will have no problem finding those elsewhere; reissues and classic reprints are included sparingly.

Prologue

Midsummer Day’s sun blazed white in the centre of the sky. The sky burned blue to the horizon. The flagship of the King crossed abruptly from the limpid green of shallow water to the dark indigo of limitless depths.

The galleon’s captain shouted orders; the sailors hurried to obey. Canvas flapped, then filled; the immense square sails snapped taut in the wind. The ship creaked and groaned and leaned into its turn. The flag of Louis XIV fluttered, writing Nec Pluribus Impar, the King’s motto, across the sky. The emblem of Louis XIV, a golden sunburst, shone from the galleon’s foretopsail.

Free of the treacherous shoals, the galleon plunged ahead. Water rushed against the ship’s sides. The gilt figurehead stretched its arms into sunlight and spray. Rainbows shimmered from its claws and from the flukes of its double tail. The carven sea monster flung coloured light before it, for the glory of the King.

Having just worked through the next 6 months of fantastical output we’re finding it as hard as ever to restrain our top picks; just so much great stuff! But there really is something about July this year where we’ve straightforwardly had to say ‘whatever – all this must go in’… And these aren’t even the end of the story – check out the individual Publisher articles for their July to December output as they come: plenty more on those as well!

The Pastor adjusted his cassock. It was hot and itchy under the noonday sun. He knocked on the door again, harder this time. It was no surprise they hadn’t heard him, with all that was going on inside. He would wait before knocking once more.

His shaggie was tethered to a rail that ran the length of the house. There was a trough that the animal was drinking from. The sky was clear today, but Pine Ridge got more rain than Barkley. The house was on the outskirts of town. Half a mile or more between neighbours – a good, discreet distance. He pulled at his collar. He’d like to take it off but the Good Lord was watching. Always watching.

The Good Book felt heavy in the Pastor’s hand. He knocked again.

This time he heard movement from inside. Boards creaked and the door swung open. A large woman grimaced at him. She was sweating. Not just from her brow, but her arms were slick all the way from her rolled-up sleeves to her wrists. The sister.

A girl hurried barefoot through the streets of what had once been East London.

She stumbled, clumsy in her haste, and caught herself with the iron railing she carried in her right hand. Her skin was covered in scales of tiny terracotta rooftops. A fringe of rubberised cable fell across her forehead from under the hood of her sweatshirt. The hair-fine streets that crisscrossed her back were flooded with oily sweat. As she ran, her shadow loomed and shambled in front of her, stretched by the dawn.

Beth could barely keep her eyes open. Hunger, exhaustion and week after week of pretending to be fine had hollowed her out. She licked her dry lips. She could sense the pulse of the street under her, but instead of slapping her soles flat to the pavement and replenishing herself from that tan­talising thrum of energy, she ran on tiptoes like she was trying to avoid broken glass. She looked up at where the houses had used to be and swallowed fearfully. Hungry as she was, she didn’t dare feed here.

About (from the author’s site):

Sarah Pinborough is a critically acclaimed horror, thriller and YA author. In the UK she is published by both Gollancz and Jo Fletcher Books at Quercus and by Ace, Penguin and Titan in the US. Her short stories have appeared in several anthologies and she has a horror film Cracked currently in development and another original screenplay under option. She has recently branched out into television writing and has written for New Tricks on the BBC and has an original series in development with World Productions and ITV Global.

About (from the author’s site)

I’m a novelist, very occasionally a dabbler in poetry and short fiction, and always an avid reader and lover of story. My second novel, Binary, has just been published in North America; it’s the sequel to Gemsigns, and they’re now both available everywhere books in English are sold. The third book of the ®Evolution trilogy, Regeneration, will be out in the UK in August 2015. I’m published by Jo Fletcher Books/Quercus and represented by Ian Drury. I live in London.

In 2010 I launched the Scriptopus interactive web app to make it easier for myself and other writers to spend at least 15 minutes a day making stuff up. The year after that I wrote my first novel, Gemsigns. The year after that I sold it as part of a three-book deal. A little application goes a long way. (If you want to know more about Scriptopus, that story is here.)

May brings another great package of debuts, latest-in-series, hardbacks and new in paperbacks of the science fictional and fantastical – here’s our top recommends of the month!

Generally if we have to limit our picks (and we do!) we’ll err on the side of new titles and those now in mass market paperbacks. But there’s a bunch of fabulous reissues in May, no less than four, that we just couldn’t not include – one being a top personal favourite: Michael Marshall Smith’s Only Forward. If you haven’t already bought and read you really have to do yourself and favour and do so now! Similarly, and having endeavored to limit ourselves to a single ‘Top Recommend’ over the last months, we just had to go for two in May.

Both have actually been out in a different form before. One has been a YA wattpad phenomenon, now deservedly in print; the other was released by the author in a limited print edition a few years back and now has its mainstream debut.

And if you don’t know what these might be then read on and find out – but don’t go too fast and miss the rest of the awesome publishing in May!

Herein, via links to individual pages, lies the more-or-less complete output of UK SFF publishers and the major worldwide Graphic Novel publishers for January to June 2015!

We’ve applied selection criteria with the assumption that readers with a penchant for paranormal romance and titles more for the American market will have no problem finding their next read elsewhere; reissues and back-in-print classic titles are included sparingly.

Another month of amazing books coming up (days away as of time of writing) with a mix of debuts and eagerly awaited follow-ups and conclusions whether as first edition hardbacks and trades, ‘new in paperback’, or straight into mass market PB. This is our shortlist of the great titles coming and, as ever, our pick of the month is a tough call; but similarly something we just thought deserved a good shout out about. This time it’s neither London set or authored, but a writer getting touted by such names as a certain Mr G.R.R. Martin, and of the steampunk genre to boot.

But it’s another incredible month of the fantastical and speculative, so read on and see what delights await in March!

The first month of 2015 brings readers a superb list from which to pick their next read, and anyone attempting to recommend an unenviable task in trying to pick the best – one we couldn’t quite achieve without allowing ourselves a joint award. Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s a look at what Jo Fletcher books have coming for you over the period January to June 2015! We’ll be bringing you our particular recommends of all publishers together by month of publication. Note: Publication dates are liable to change and some jackets are still to come…